


Maybe This Time

by AKA_47



Category: The Newsroom (US TV)
Genre: F/M, prompt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-23
Updated: 2015-02-23
Packaged: 2018-03-14 19:03:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,241
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3422138
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AKA_47/pseuds/AKA_47
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's been a long road to happiness, and Mac has tried to find it by making others happy. She's tired of changing herself for everyone else though. Will makes it abundantly clear that she doesn't have to, that she's enough. Sometimes that's all you need for happiness. <br/>My attempt at lilacmermaid25's February prompt.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Maybe This Time

**Author's Note:**

> This is for lilacmermaid25's February prompt which was supposed to start with, "let's get married." Of course, I couldn't just let them all be happy and filled with fluff, so, there's some angst (ending with fluff). I don't really use Tumblr though so I hope it's okay just to post it here. I also hope the dates make sense. I tried. The title comes from a song in Cabaret. Enjoy!

**March 24, 2004**

“Let’s get married.” Brian tossed the words at her scornfully, as if she were a child wishing on a falling star. “Is that what you want me to say?”

Mackenzie could feel heat crawling up her neck and across her cheeks. How could he do that so easily? Make her feel small and stupid?

“No.” She busied herself with retrieving forgotten clothing from the floor, clinging to the bed sheet like a shield.

“Liar.” Half acerbic, half mocking. That’s how it was with them. With him.

“I’m not,” she said, ashamed of how quiet the words were. “I don’t want you to do anything you don’t _want_ to, and you obviously don’t want to marry me.”

Brian sighed, reaching for her and pulling her back to face him. “I don’t,” he said plainly, “but you knew how I felt about all that shit when you met me.” The implication of his tone was as clear as day, _you can’t go back on your word._

Mac forced herself to smile, pushing down the trepidation in her heart as she tried to convince herself that Brian was right, that she could be happy with this life if only she could accept it. She’d made a choice. Brian was a choice, and once Mackenzie McHale set her mind to something, she never failed.

“Right,” she said, only a little tremulously.

Brian fell back onto the pillows, swiping a tired hand over his face. “So stop whining and go to sleep,” he ordered, his eyes already closed.

_Whining._ Because wanting to know where they stood or why he didn’t answer his phone the nights they didn’t spend together, why he always seemed to evade her simplest questions, those were completely unreasonable demands of the man she was in a relationship with. She almost believed it. Brian had a way of making her feel like she expected too much, needed too much.

She swung back into bed, pulling the covers up to her chin and blinking against the sudden stinging in her eyes. “Brian?”

“Yes?” He asked gruffly.

“Do you love me?”

“What a stupid question.”

Mac turned to face him, her heart turning to lead. “Why? Why is it stupid?”

But he was already asleep.

 

\---

**April 20, 2010**

“How long were you with him after that?” Jim asked, taking a swig of beer.

Mac looked down, inspecting her own drink with much more interest than was necessary. “A while.”

Jim shook his head, training his eyes to the busy airport just outside of where they sat. If he squinted he could just make out their gate, which showed that their flight to New York was delayed. “I don’t get it,” he said, still not looking at her.

Mac’s answering laugh was tinged with bitterness. “You didn’t know Brian. He wasn’t always such a…”

“Jerk?” Jim answered helpfully, casting his eyes up.

“That’s about the sum of it.”

“Nope. I still don’t get it. You’re too smart not to see that it wasn’t right, that you didn’t deserve to be treated like that.”

She smiled at him, so bright that he could feel his cheeks color just looking at her. “You’re sweet, but I did deserve it. A little.”

Because she’d been selfish, self-absorbed, desperate to make him a project, a test. Could she make him love her? Could she change him? She hadn’t even noticed him changing her, _lessening_ her, until it was too late. She thought she’d let it go when they broke it off, but then he was calling again and the urge was too great. She couldn’t fail at him even then, and she’d hurt Will, God she’d hurt herself too, and that was Brian’s legacy. But if she could go back to New York and mend her fences with Will, then it didn’t have to be her legacy too.

“No way,” Jim said, pulling her back to reality. “You’re amazing, Mac. Everyone loves you.”

_Not everyone. Not the one person who mattered._

Jim was blushing again. “I mean it. Anyone who doesn’t, they’re crazy, and they’re not worth it.”

Mac stood up, fishing out her wallet and laying out the money for their drinks. “Jim, you are quite possibly the most loyal friend I could ever ask for.”

Jim shrugged. “You deserve it.”

And damned if she knew if he was right (he probably wasn’t), but if she could be even a tenth of the woman Jim seemed to think she was, then she would be all right.

\----

**December 22, 2010**

“...married.”

Mackenzie’s eyes flew up and she nearly spit out the half chewed lettuce of her salad. Lately (or since the beginning if she was being honest with herself) she found it difficult to concentrate on what Wade said to her. Her mind was in the newsroom, on her team. Will. The mention of marriage though was certainly enough to shock her into the present.“What?” She choked out.

He smirked at her expression, his own not entirely kind. “I was just saying that one of my coworkers got married.”

Mackenzie relaxed, forcing herself to smile. “That’s wonderful.”

“Is it?” Wade asked.

“I don’t know what you mean.”

“Give me some credit, Mac. I could be blind and I would have noticed your reaction just now. Do you want to be in this or not?”

It should have been an easy yes. Wade was smart and ambitious and his eyes didn’t glaze over when he listened to her political rants. More than that he was polite and polished and seemed to have his shit together. He should have been exactly what she was looking for. She should have been begging for the chance to marry him.

But, she wasn’t. She didn’t even miss him when they didn’t see each other. She didn’t feel anything at all about him, really. Still, she didn’t break it off, couldn’t. She didn’t want to be the one to go home alone every night while Will paraded dates around the newsroom. She wouldn’t be the sad ex who really should have gotten the hint already because, c’mon, it had been fucking _years._ Mackenzie would absolutely not be the one to wake up one day and realize that everyone’s life had moved on while she sat there stagnant. She was smarter than that. No, she was too lonely for that.

“I’m in.” She forced her gaze to steady before his.

For a moment it looked like he might say more, challenge her, but then his focus shifted to the steak that had just arrived at their table. “Okay. Let’s eat.”

And though Mac tried to pay attention to her dinner, she couldn’t quite shake the feeling of deja vu, that she was again trying to convince herself of something she knew wasn’t true…

 

\----

**February 4, 2013**

Sometimes it was easy to forget the years that had slipped between them, Will and Mac. Sometimes it seemed as though they’d just picked up where they left off. Older, sure, but smarter too. The impromptu engagement helped with that feeling. It wasn’t like they’d sat down and discussed the possibility of marriage. They hadn’t even been in a relationship for Christ’s sake. Most of the time she was grateful for it, not to have to fumble through the tedium of dating which is really just an elaborate act to present your best self to the other person all the while trying desperately to hide every doubt and insecurity.

Sometimes though, Mackenzie couldn’t help but remember the road that had led her here, sitting next to Will at the conference table with whatever lunch Jenna had been sent out to fetch, pretending to go over notes for the show while they really just whispered wedding plans. It all felt so easy with Will, but it hadn’t been easy at all, not really.

“What is it?” Will asked, pausing the work he’d been doing drawing patterns across her knee under the table.

Mackenzie bit her lip, a reflex to hold back what she really thought, but she didn’t have to do that. Not with him. “I think I’ve spent a lot of my life trying to be what other people wanted me to be. I don’t want to do that anymore.” She squeezed his hand.

She was surprised to see panic flicker across Will’s face. “You don’t have to _be_ anything for me, Mackenzie. Shit, if I ever make you feel like you can’t say whatever you’re feeling…” He cast around in the air for a solution, “slap me.”

Mackenzie laughed. “Not with you, idiot.” She giggled again when his face relaxed despite the insult. “Honestly, when have I ever _listened_ to anything you’ve said?”

Will raised his brows at her. “Ouch. I’m wounded.”

“Oh, stop.” Mac decided to fervently ignore the fact that they were surrounded by glass walls and leaned in, pressing her lips quickly to his. She also decided to steadfastly ignore the whistling from the bullpen that followed.

“There was that one time.” She conceded, brushing her hair back behind her ear.

“That you listened?”

She nodded. “I’m marrying you, aren’t I?”

“Thank God.”

“So,” Mackenzie said, smiling as she made a show of examining the papers before her. “Place settings. There are a lot of options.”

Will groaned. “Of course there are.”

Mac glared. “No complaining,” she warned.

“Wouldn’t dream of it.” He stilled her hand with his own as she tapped her pen rapidly against the table. “I don’t understand.”

Mac’s brow furrowed. “Place settings? They’re the things that go on the table, Will. I knew you were clueless about weddings, but really?”

“No. Why you would change one thing about yourself. For anyone.”

She blushed, studying the words on the page until they blurred. “For the same reason you want the audience to like you, I think.”

“A fucked up childhood?” It didn’t sound much like a joke and neither of them laughed.

She could feel his eyes on her and forced herself to look up. “I wanted…”

Mackenzie wasn’t even sure what she’d wanted. Not them exactly. They could have been anyone. Nameless, faceless males who only mattered in the sense that they were not Will.

“Approval?” She ventured. “I was so afraid to be alone that I tried to make myself whatever they wanted.” She knew vaguely that she should have been embarrassed, but she saw in Will’s face face that he understood. All of it. Her hesitation. Her confusion. Her answer.

Will cleared his throat. “Well, I will love you even if you spend the rest of your life screaming and throwing things at me.”

Mac’s smile shook a little with the force of her emotions. “A distinct possibility,” she conceded.

“And I’m still here. Always.”

In that moment Mac felt it was much more likely that she would spend the rest of her life kissing him and she closed the distance between their lips with record speed to prove it.

“You are enough. Exactly like this.”

So often in their relationship, Will and Mac joked. They teased and argued, slipping into sarcasm like a second tongue. There was nothing but seriousness between them now. She didn’t need the words, technically. She knew that Will loved her. More than that, that he respected her. All the same, the words fell into her heart, filling all the empty slots she’d never even known she had.

“You’re doing really well with words today.” She couldn’t quite manage to make her words light.

“Because I mean them.” Will stood up and she followed, stepping into his arms, pressing her cheek against his chest.

“For whatever it’s worth, I feel the same way about you.”

He laughed, his hands slipping through her hair all the while. “That’s worth more than just about anything, in case you haven’t noticed. But, Mac, we might have to get to actual work.”

“Why?” She murmured contentedly into his shirt.

“Open your eyes.” There was a tremor of laughter in his voice that made her weary, and she cautiously looked over to see what seemed like the entire staff clustered outside the glass doors, watching them, some with sappy expressions on their faces that made them look as though they were watching a Nicholas Sparks movie. Gary had a grin on his face that made Mackenzie absolutely certain that she was going to regret breaking her “No PDA in the Office” rule. Jim, at least, had the decency to pretend that he wasn’t watching, leaning against his desk with only a sideways glance in their direction. Still, the corners of his mouth tilted up and Mac didn’t miss it.

Mac stepped away, shaking her head at the people in the bullpen. “If I didn’t know better I would think they had no personal lives.”

Will held the door open for her. “I think they’re just more interested in ours.”

“It serves us right, really, taking so long to get together.”

Will shrugged as they both pointedly ignored the looks of the staff on the way to their offices. “At least we gave them their happy ending.”

Mac beamed at him. “We did.”

_Happy._ She used to think that she would have to change it’s definition, that she would spend her life seeking it for others, but Mackenzie was undeniably happy, and she didn’t have to make concessions for it. She didn’t have to worry that it would disappear one day. It was stable and sure, _hers,_ finally.


End file.
